“Repression is spreading like gas in a room: as long as there’s space there, it’s going to expand.”

What’s Alexander Lukashenko’s game plan in Belarus? Could the West have done more when protests broke out last year, and does it have any tools to impact the situation there now? Is there any alternative to Lukashenko that would be acceptable to Russia, or is any future regime now destined to be anti-Russian? Artyom Shraibman, a non-resident scholar at Carnegie Moscow Center, and Sabine Fischer, a senior fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Studies, join podcast host Alex Gabuev to discuss events in Belarus.

Podcast host Alex Gabuev is joined by Andrey Movchan, a nonresident scholar in the Economic Policy Program at the Carnegie Moscow Center, and Maria Shagina, a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Eastern European Studies at the University of Zurich, to discuss the impact of Western sanctions on the Russian economy.

After eight years of Western sanctions, has the Russian economy suffered substantially as a result? Do the latest U.S. sanctions in fact show that Washington is ready to turn the page? How successful has Russia’s import substitution been? And how far do sanctions actually play into the Kremlin’s hands at home?

In the wake of the first summit of the Quad countries (the United States, Japan, Australia, and India), this episode of the podcast focuses on the grouping’s scope, its cooperation with other nations, Russia’s significance in the region, and whether the rapprochement between Moscow and Beijing is impacting the long-established relationship between Russia and India. Featuring podcast host Alex Gabuev; Darshana Baruah, an associate fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; and Michito Tsuruoka, an associate professor at Keio University in Tokyo.

Is Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine as successful as the Kremlin claims? Are political considerations really preventing it from getting approval in Western countries? Why is the vaccination rate so low in Russia, and why didn’t Putin get vaccinated sooner? Podcast host Alex Gabuev is joined by Henry Foy, Moscow bureau chief of the Financial Times, and Polina Ivanova, a special correspondent for Reuters in Moscow, to discuss these questions and other vaccine-related topics.

How will Russian-Japanese relations be affected by the departure of Japan’s longtime prime minister, Shinzo Abe? What drove his policy of active engagement of Russia, and will that policy continue under his successor? What potential remains for cooperation? Podcast host Alex Gabuev is joined by Taisuke Abiru to discuss these issues and more.